As a major market strategy for 2013, Yuchai Machinery Co., Ltd. has worked out a plan of "further segmenting the market and optimizing products to sharpen the competitiveness of Yuchai power".

Launching YC4EG engine targeting the midsize commercial vehicle market and meeting the requirements of the national IV emission standard is exactly a key part of the plan.

Yuchai launches upgraded model YC4EG targeting segments

"Yuchai was further perfecting its product structure in the previous years. Now it has all series of vehicle engines ranging from 1.4L to 13L, next it will further segment the market and optimize products to sharpen the competitiveness of Yuchai power," Zhong Yuwei, deputy general manager of Yuchai Machinery Co., Ltd., said in an interview, adding, "One of our strategies is deepening segments and the segmented products."

YC4EG-40 engine

Launching YC4EG engine targeting the midsize commercial vehicle market and meeting the requirements of the national IV emission standard is exactly a key part of the plan. "Now Yuchai's product chain is perfect, despite great efforts in the marketing of light-duty and heavy-duty products in the next period, maintaining and consolidating the existing market share of medium-duty products is similar important," Zhong noted.

According to sources, Yuchai has worked with Britain's Ricardo on the YC4EG project. It was developed through cylinder diameter enlargement and stroke increase (112x120mm) on the basis of Yuchai's original YC4E common-rail model (110x112mm); with its displacement increasing from 4.26L to 4.73L, using SCR post-processing technology, it is up to the national IV emission standard; with a maximum power of 200PS, it can operation normally at 180PS; positioned as a medium and high-end product, it is predominated by 180PS- models and targets coaches ranging from 7 meters to 8.5 meters as well as 42 and 62 medium-duty highway trucks.

Referring to YC4EG's positioning, Yuchai's engine R & D staff further explained, YC4EG subdivides markets on the basis of only differentiating the truck market from the coach market in the past. "For example, we have divided the coach market into the bus market and the highway bus market, because they totally differ in requirements to working conditions. We must keep segmenting these markets and identify their special requirements to engines, thereby gaining more advantages for segmented products.

In the coach field, YC4EG targets the 8m short & medium-distance coach market; in the bus field, it will meet the power demand of 7m-8.5m buses for engines at the stage of national IV. As truck power, it aims to satisfy the demand of highway trucks for short & medium-distance local transport and urban logistics transport at the stage of national IV, including 42 and 62 standard highway trucks, medium-distance trucks and modified special vehicles (box truck, van, cargo truck, sanitation truck, mail car, auto crane, etc.); in the field of dump truck, it aims to satisfy the demand for partial short & medium-distance local transport and urban logistics transport at the stage of national IV.

Multiple performance improvement boosts YC4EG's segment competitiveness

According to sources, based on market development in the previous years, YC4E has been widely recognized by customers in the domestic light & medium-duty commercial vehicle market. Many light & medium-duty customers affectionately called YC4E "Yuchai 4110". Then, compared to YC4E, what significant improvements have been made to YC4EG?

"Compared to YC4E, YC4EG meets the domestic demand for emission, noise and power upgrading, gives customers a sense of all-round upgrading by improving elements like quality, and has especially increased its weak power on engineering vehicles and three-axis pickups," said Yuchai's R & D staff.

Concretely, YC4EG has a maximum power of 200hp, up 25 percent compared to YC4E and a maximum torque of 720N.m, up 30 percent compared to YC4E; however, YC4EG is priced slightly higher than YC4E, but as its minimum specific fuel consumption has decreased from less than 200g/kW.h to less than 195g/kW.h, YC4EG's use cost is relatively low; most importantly, the rate of parts for common use of YC4EG and YC4E is up to 80 percent, thus parts are easy to get and maintain; additionally, YC4EG's B10 life (B10 life is the time point of product working, when products work to this point, 10 percent of products are expected to break down) exceeds 500,000 kilometers, two thirds more than that of YC4E.

"Also, YC4EG is integrated, light, compact and technically advanced; with high overall strength and a pressure resistance capacity of 200bar, it has the potential to meet the requirements of national V and VI emission standards in the future; with a maximum power of 200PS, it ensures reliable use under 180PS. In comparative tests with competing products, data showed YE4EG was two seconds faster and saved around 1 liter of fuel per 100 kilometers from starting to a speed of 80km/h," the staff added.

As to the reason for so many technical improvements to YC4EG, the staff explained, emission regulations are the country's policy orientation and enterprises' social responsibility, but customers pay more attention to engine economy, applicability and reliability. "Particularly, it costs much to upgrade from national III and national IV, without value added, the cost increase will be unacceptable to the cost increase. Thus, besides being up to emission standards, a prominent advantage of YC4EG is boosting its segment competitiveness.

(Li Xuelei/cvworld.cn)